


The Medium Place

by EdmondJames_Dantes



Category: NCIS, The Good Place (TV)
Genre: Angst and Humor, I don't know where I went wrong, Sorry Not Sorry, Sort Of, This was meant to be crack, implied happy ending, kind of, short and sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-26
Updated: 2018-03-26
Packaged: 2019-04-08 09:42:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,348
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14102658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EdmondJames_Dantes/pseuds/EdmondJames_Dantes
Summary: Gibbs wakes up after six bullets to the chest.





	The Medium Place

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Appletini](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Appletini/gifts).



> this is entirely Appletini's fault, i hope you're happy with yourself. no but seriously, this was great fun to write, i hope it makes for good reading!
> 
> you shouldn't need to know much if anything about 'The Good Place' in order to read this. that said, all my info for it is coming from like the first season and a half, so anything you find out later that might be pertinent to this universe doesn't apply.

 

 

 

 

 

Gibbs wakes up in a white room.

 

The only shocking thing is that he wakes up.

 

Somehow, he's not fazed to be lying on the floor staring up at an endless white - no ceiling in sight - or to be surrounded by a distinct lack of walls. As he stands up and gets a proper look around, it occurs to him that it probably doesn't count as a room, but he doesn't have any other word for it.

 

He's meant to be dead. But somehow he doubts that he could survive six bullets to the chest, so, whatever this strange place is, it's probably the afterlife. Not that he truly believed in one back when he was on Earth, only hoped for Heaven to exist, for Shannon and Kelly's sakes.

 

"You are the most irritating man I have ever had the pleasure and misfortune of knowing," says a familiar and long-suffering voice from behind him.

 

Gibbs whirls around. Mike - grumpy, whiskey-swilling, mentor, _dead_ Mike Franks is glaring at him. Gibbs isn't even surprised.

 

"Hey Mike," says Gibbs, smiling ruefully, stepping towards him.

 

"Wipe that grin off your face!" snaps Mike, sounding truly pissed off.

 

Gibbs falters. "What's wrong?"

 

"You and your damn selfishness, is what's wrong!" roars Mike. "How many times have we tried to get through to you that your lone wolf bullshit is harmful? To yourself and your loved ones?"

 

Gibbs scowls at Mike. "You have no right to judge me!"

 

"No, I don't," Mike rubs a hand over his face. "If I had that right, you wouldn't be in this mess. You'd be safe with Shannon and Kelly, regardless of your stupid hard-headedness."

 

"What?" whispers Gibbs, fear gripping his heart. "I'm dead, aren't I? Why can't I be with my girls?"

 

Mike looks away, and it takes a long moment for Gibbs to recognise that it's sorrow lining his face. "It's not that simple, Jethro. I don't make the rules."

 

"If the rules aren't good enough, then break them!" snaps Gibbs.

 

"Oh shut up, Jethro! Your belief that your rules trump everyone else's is part and parcel of what got you into this mess!"

 

"Well sometimes my rules are better!"

 

"And sometimes they're not! Jesus Christ, we could do this all day." Mike sighs. "Look, I fought for you, alright? I argued that all the good you've done outweighs the bad. We all did. Shannon, Kelly, Ziva, Ned, Jenny, Paula, fucking everyone who's life you saved at one point or another. Fuck, even your damn ex-wife weighed in on your side. We're all on your side."

 

"But it wasn't enough," says Gibbs, hearing it in what Mike isn't saying, his heart slowly cracking open and breaking. "Nobody listened?"

 

"Oh, no. They listened. That's the only reason you're not in The Bad Place. The only reason I get to be here and explain what's going on, instead of you being shoved into your new place without any explanation."

 

"Well, you haven't explained much of anything yet!" snarls Gibbs, lashing out. All he can hear is the blood rushing through his ears. All he wanted upon death was to be reunited with his wife and daughter. Is that truly too much to ask for?

 

"Relax, Jethro. The Bad Place doesn't get you. The problem is, neither does The Good Place."

 

Gibbs takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. Tries to calm his thundering heart. He can work with that, he doesn't like it, but it's better than literally going to Hell - for what else could the bad place be? What could the good place be except Heaven? "Where am I? What is this place?"

 

Mike shakes his head. "This  is just an in-between place, even I don't know what it is. But you're going to a medium place. Or rather, The Medium Place. There's only one of them. Not often someone falls exactly on the halfway mark, but you would insist on being special, wouldn't you?"

 

It's Gibbs' turn to shake his head. "I only wanted to be with my girls." Tears fill his eyes.

 

Mike softens, slightly. "I wish you had listened to me, to us. You were so damned close, Jethro."

 

"I'm sorry," whispers Gibbs, meaning it.

 

"I know, but it's too late now. The bosses are a lot more like you than they'd like to admit. And when they've made up their minds..."

 

Gibbs feels sick to his stomach. "They don't change their minds. They stick with what they think is right."

 

"Yeah. Listen, Jethro," Mike hesitated. "There's one more thing they told me to tell you."

 

Gibbs laughs mirthlessly. "Go on. Try me. What more could they do to me? They've already ruled out sending me to their Bad Place. Joke's on them. Life without Shannon and Kelly _is_ Hell."

 

Mike stares at him with pity. Gibbs looks away.

 

"I've been told that what I'm about to tell you is both a punishment and a reward, as in accordance with your new status in The Medium Place, where you'll always have a little of both. A balanced afterlife."

 

"Fuck balance," says Gibbs hotly.

 

Mike ignored him. "You and Shannon are soul-mates."

 

The blunt acknowledgement of it makes Gibbs wince. "I know," he says sadly.

 

Mike nods, and takes a deep breath. "They're giving her a second soul-mate."

 

Gibbs blinks. "Sorry, I think I misheard you. What'd you just say?"

 

"God damn you and your bullshit, Jethro! Since you won't be going to The Good Place, they're bringing someone in to take your place, to be a husband for her and a daddy for your little girl."

 

The world grinds to a stop beneath Gibbs's feet. "Yeah," he says faintly, his knees turning to jelly, "That's what I thought I heard you say."

 

"I'm sorry," says Mike, his voice seeming to come to Gibbs from far away. "I don't know who it is or how it'll work, but the higher ups wanted you to know."

 

There's something clawing its way through Gibbs' chest: a furious, terrified, broken scream building in his lungs. Because he understands - how could he not? - he understands the reward for himself is that Shannon, his soul mate, will not have to spend eternity waiting on him. She'll fall in love again, with a better man, with someone who will never let her down. Love is putting other people's needs first, and he loves Shannon, and wants her to have a happily ever after.

 

The punishment, of course, is that he's not that man with whom she'll spend her happy ending.

 

Gibb will never see his wife and child ever again.

 

His mouth opens of its own accord and he screams.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They put him on a train.

 

He doesn't care.

 

Gibbs puts his head back against the window and his feet up on the seat and lets himself fall asleep.

 

When he drifts back awake, the train has stopped and there's a woman he doesn't know standing beside him, patiently waiting. She tells him things he doesn't pay attention to, and while she's still talking, he grabs his bag - not sure when he acquired a bag - and walks away.

 

He gets off the train, noticing but not caring to question why an afterlife train to the middle of butt-fuck no-where is an old _steam engine_ train and not, at the least, an electric train, or some other kind of futuristic or magical train, and he wanders off  in search of the mediocre house where he's meant to spend the rest of his medium eternity.

 

When he finds it beyond the trees, it's a boring house, one that looks vaguely similar to his own, in a plain, suburban kind of way. Under other circumstances, he might even like it. There's nothing, in every direction, for miles, a vastness that mimics the flat plains of the US.

 

Gibbs always did like his solitude, and the natural world. If this boring house under an open, fine-tempered sky, had Shannon and Kelly, and maybe the ability to visit his friends, and his mom and dad, every now and then, it would probably be pretty close to paradise for him.

 

As it is, the afterlife without Shannon and Kelly is The Bad Place, for him anyway. So, he looks up at the house, and he doesn't give a shit how _just_ _fine_ it is. He hates it. Or, Gibbs decides, he would hate it if he could be bothered to hate it.

 

He can't be bothered.

 

He just doesn't _care_. Not about anything, not anymore.

 

Gibbs knocks on the door, and after a long minute - the kind that actually lasts sixty seconds or more, tempting him into knocking a second time - a naked woman answers it.

 

They stare at each other for a minute - the short kind of minute that only exists for 10 seconds, if that - then: "Hi!" she says brightly. "Did Eleanor send me more cocaine?"

 

"No," Gibbs says uncaringly.

 

"Oh." The woman's face falls. "Wait! Are you another sex robot?" she says eagerly, brightening up again.

 

"No," he says evenly; unnerved, but not wanting to show it.

 

"That's a pity, you're better looking than Derek."

 

Gibbs scowls. "I don't care. I'm meant to live here now." The _with you_ is implied with a great deal of irritation, but the irritation clearly goes over the woman's head.

 

"Do you have a functioning penis?" she asks hopefully.

 

"Are you going to let me in?" counters Gibbs. He'd ask for an introduction as well, but he _doesn't care._

 

The woman beams at him, steps aside, and flings the door wide open, making it crash into the wall. She gestures him grandly into the house.

 

Gibbs stares at her in disbelief. "I wasn't making a come-on," he says sourly, but he steps inside before she can slam the door into his face.

 

He walks through to the living room. It's plain, there's an older TV - though it's actually a newer one than what he had - and couches that look lumpy and inviting to sleep on, and actually, this Medium Place doesn't seem so bad. It's not good, it's not what he would have wanted, but he genuinely can't say it's horrible or torture.

 

"So, you got a name, handsome?" The naked woman has followed him through, and she's still, oddly, naked.

 

"Do you have any clothes?" asks Gibbs. It's not that he's put off, but he could do without her tits swinging as she walks and talks to him.

 

"Yes, but this is my house and it's currently my naked hour," she explains promptly, smiling at him. She waves a hand at his groin, "So, what kind of dick do you have?"

 

"The spatula kind," says Gibbs, for the first time having to work at _not_ caring. Anger eats away at his control, "Why are you so darned concerned with my cock?" He's briefly confused, he could have sworn he was going to say _damned._

 

"Oooh, really, a spatula dick?" pipes up a new, deeper voice from behind him.

 

Gibbs whirls around. There's a man standing there, short with lots of curly hair, standing far too close for Gibbs's comfort. The man's naked too. _Figures_ , thinks Gibbs, taking a step back for propriety's sake _._

 

"Hi, I'm Derek," says Derek cheerfully, "I have wind chimes for a dick!"

 

Gibbs stares into his eyes, and stares into his eyes, and stares- and nope, curiosity gets the better of him and he quickly glances down. His head jerks back up. "I can see that," he says, wishing he hadn't.

 

At least he's not the only man who's been punished by having his penis transformed into something else.

 

"What'd you do to get wind chimes for a cock?"

 

"I was made like this!" Derek smiles wildly. His word are nonsensical, and Gibbs doesn't like his smile, it's too big, too incongruent for the situation; it unnerves him more than anything else.

 

"What about you, handsome? How did you get a spatula for a dick?" asks the naked woman, and really, Gibbs should find out her name at some point, if only for simplicity's sake. "Do you want to give it a try with me? I bet we can work something out."

 

"I pissed off the wrong person." Gibbs glares back and forth between the weirdo and the woman. "I'm good at that." He shoves past Derek and storms off toward the staircase, in search of a bedroom he can claim for his own. Hopefully one with a lock on the inside of the door.

 

For a place called The Medium Place, there's surprisingly little that's mediocre about its people.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tony wakes up on what feels like Gibbs's couch. He yawns and stretches, feeling better rested than he has in years. Normally he has a few aches and pains in his old age, but for some reason they're not making themselves known this morning.

 

It's not until he sits up that it clicks what's wrong: he actually _is_ on Gibbs's couch, in Gibbs's living room, facing a little girl that's sitting cross-legged on Gibbs's coffee table.

 

"Hi Tony," she says, giving a tiny smile. She's resting her chin on her elbow. She's absolutely adorable, but she's also meant to be dead.

 

"Hi Kelly," says Tony, smiling gently back at her. Calm on the outside, but freaking out and screaming on the inside - half dread and half happiness, because if this is real, if _Kelly Gibbs_ is truly sitting in front of him, then _her father..._

 

"We need your help, Tony," says Kelly seriously, a solemn look on her face that Tony remembers having seen on Gibbs's.

 

"Anything, Kelly, but first, _please,_ where's your dad? Can I see him?"

 

Kelly bites her lip, and Tony's heart skips a beat. _Something's wrong._

 

"That's what we need your help with," says a new voice, not unkindly, but firm. Shannon Gibbs is leaning against the door jamb. "Jethro's not here," she says softly, sadly, tiredly.

 

Tony swallows hard. Looking between them, there's only one thing to say to Shannon and Kelly, no matter where Leroy Jethro Gibbs might be. "Then let's go get our man."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> i nearly left the ending at Gibbs's POV, but it was too sad for me, so i added a dose of hope in the form of Tony.
> 
> this was legit meant to be a cracky one-off about Gibbs having a spatula dick (thanks for putting that image in my head, really, it was exactly what i needed. not.) hahaha, anyway, then i started thinking about how he'd get into that situ and now i've got a shitload of headcanon for this thing that i'm never gonna write more of ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
> 
> btw, i guess it's true what they say about writers, we love torturing our favourite characters. i feel like i owe Gibbs an apology.
> 
> also, i've always been fascinated by how relationships would play out in some kind of afterlife, but especially with fanfic situations where Gibbs obviously very much loves Shannon but then falls for someone else, be it Tony or another character. so if anyone wants to write a little continuation or sequel to this which explores dealing with that, please go right ahead, all i ask is that you tell me when you post it! :)
> 
> thank you very much for suffering through reading this, i'm not sorry and i'm not apologising.
> 
> cheers,  
> Edmond.


End file.
